FRANKLIN COUNTY -– Parts I and II of the Maine Energy and the Future series identified the energy problem here in Maine, one of potentially major proportions. Mainers rely heavily on fossil fuel energy sources to heat and power their home and fuel their automobiles. The cost to continue to do so, compared to the average state-wide income for individuals, could cause catastrophic times for Mainers ahead.

With a panel of Maine energy experts including local inventors, UMO professors and businessmen from the energy sector, Part III identified some misleading policies and lost opportunities experienced in the past here in Maine.
Parts IV and V will look at potential energy sources for the future and what some answers and solutions are, which Mainer’s may or may not want the hear.

Professor Richard C. Hill Emeritus says energy will enter the public arena under the following rubrics: contributor to global warming; increased residential, commercial and industrial cost; subject of political contention; demand for renewable sources; etc.


CO2 REDUCTION IN THE ATMOSPHERE

Hill said there are options and ways we can reduce the carbon dioxide that mankind produces each year. What the climatologists are worried about is if trapping additional radiation from the sun causes the ocean temps to rise just a tad, the additional evaporation from the ocean is what is going to drive global warming not the carbon dioxide itself.

According to Hill, plant growth and decay produces 60 billion tons (or 60 giga-tons --GtC) of carbon that goes in and out of the atmosphere every year. The oceans emit 90 giga-tons a year. “That’s 150 giga-tons of carbon going round and round.”

The atmosphere can store 750 GtC and the ocean 700. Each year mankind, burning fossil fuel, adds six GtC. “The trouble with that ‘six’ is that it’s very stable. The CO2 doesn’t break up and become carbon,” Hill explained.

“Six thousand GtC of carbon are still in the earth in the form of oil, coal and natural gas.”

Hill has mentioned in the past that we can not continue to mess with the atmosphere and need to find ways to reduce CO2 emissions.

The former professor and frequent speaker provided examples of CO2 reduction which certainly is consistent with “the magnitude” issues of Part II.

Hill referenced the fact that there are 800 million cars in the world, but cited a fact from British Petroleum which uses a two-billion-car figure possibly projecting into the future. Having said that, if we doubled the efficiency of two billion cars from 30 mpg to 60 mpg, we would save one GtC.

The USA has 104 nuclear plants and the rest of the world operates 100. “If we double the amount of nuclear plants from 200 to 400, we’d save one giga ton. Assuming the nukes replace coal burning power plants,” Hill explained.
If 40,000 square kilometers of solar array or 4 million windmills were constructed to produce the hydrogen needed for the use of fuel-cell-powered cars, either of those would put away a giga-ton of carbon.

If two-million windmills were constructed, replacing coal-fired power plants, that would replace a giga ton, or if we planted one-sixth of the earth’s cropland with biomass plantations for ethanol production. “By-the-way, running ethanol, is a political statement not a scientific statement from an efficiency standpoint,” said Hill.


HYDROGEN POTENTIAL

Dr. George Markowsky spoke of hydrogen power and mentioned that it’s a possibility down the road, but there’s no infrastructure around today to support such a concept.
The concept of “Energy’s Return on Investment” (EROI) is constantly discussed by the panel of experts and that if it takes conventional energy (fossil fuel generation) to create hydrogen, the use becomes moot as a practical source for the future.

So many proposals for alternate energy sources look good on the outside and political posturing brings them to light as possible solutions, but as Jim LaBrecque says, you need a scientific evaluation based on the laws of physics and thermodynamics before making informed decisions.

Agricultural harvesting, fuel, fertilizer costs, labor and transportation must be considered before making decisions to squeeze the acres of corn field production to produce a gallon of fuel.

Brazilians have an advantage over the U.S. using sugar cane to make ethanol which has a significantly higher EROI. “Ethanol based on corn consumes more energy in its production than it returns –-clearly not a good idea,” Markowsky said. Ethanol also competes with food production in some cases.

“Hydrogen quite possibly could be an energy storage solution for the future,” Markowsky explained. Meaning it could conceptually act the same as batteries which are still lacking in technological advancements.

For example, if we had a renewable energy producer (such as wind) producing excessive amounts energy, and we took that excessive energy to create hydrogen and later burned that hydrogen to power automobiles, etc., this, as Hill pointed out, in massive proportions would help greatly in reducing CO2 emissions and be an exciting solution.


"NO NUKES" REVISITED

In terms of nuclear, Dr. Markowsky said fusion power was 50-years away, 40-years ago and still 50-years away today.
However fission power works and needs to be revisited. “There are no greenhouse gases, it is compact and the safety issues can be addressed,” Markowsky said.
Markowsky said that the Three Mile Island incident produced minimum external damage and Chernobyl’s fall-out in 1986 and the effects of such have been overstated.

“Our overall assessment of fission power is that it definitely deserves more attention, but not a short term solution.”

Fission power addresses electric energy, but not transportation or short term heating and will take years to implement. It is anticipated that a nuclear power plant might take four-years to permit and close to the same to construct.

“I have an important announcement,” Markowsky has said in the past, “winter is coming here in Maine.”

The Heritage Foundation calls the U.S. a nonstarter in nuclear power. “As China, Russia, India and other competitors embrace nuclear power to increase their energy independence, America’s inactions threaten to leave us far behind in commercial production of emission-free domestic energy … despite a growing demand for affordable electricity, not a single new one (nuclear power plant) has been ordered in 30 years. To afford Congress’s stated carbon reduction goals, we’ll need to build as many as 200 more reactors. Yet government policy remains the greatest risk to the industry,” the Foundation states.

In America, 17 entities have begun the permitting process to build up to 30 new reactors. However, not one reactor has begun construction. “Political barriers and policy shortcomings seriously threaten the prospect that many, if any, will ever be built. Over 25 reactors are currently under construction across the globe.

Jack Spencer of the Heritage Foundation highlights several such nations, including France, Japan, Finland and Britain. Finland gets nearly a third of its electricity from nuclear power, and that amount will soon go up; it's building a modern 1,600-megawatt reactor. Japan draws 30 percent of its electricity from nuclear sources, an amount set to rise to 41 percent in under a decade. Britain has 19 reactors and is a net exporter of energy. Russia is building new plants as well.

France, though, is the poster child among industrialized nations for nuclear power. Nearly 80 percent of its electricity comes from nuclear power. Stung by the oil shocks of the 1970s, France began gearing up nuclear-power production years ago. Today, it's a net exporter of electricity,” Spencer explains.

Certainly, Markowsky said, “If an abundance of nuclear power comes online tomorrow then the future will be different.”


FOSSIL FUEL FUTURE

Coal appears to be abundant in quantity for now, but has the same limitations that all fossil fuels have, meaning it is a finite resource. It’s also the most polluting of the traditional fuels producing lots of CO2 and other greenhouse gases. Coal is currently used for mostly electrical power generation in America.

There is no longer a coal-based transportation and home heating infrastructure. “When was the last time you saw a coal-powered locomotive?” Markowsky asked.

Drilling offshore is not a long term solution Markowsky said. It may produce four million barrels and last us six or so months. “We can prolong the suspense and agony for another six months,” when thinking of oil exploration.

As another possible solution, oil shale has a relatively low EROI although there’s lots of it. It involves a very environmentally disruptive extraction and refinement process. “You’ve got to crush tons of rock, heat it, use tons of water and out comes one gallon of oil. How far is that going to go? And by the time that you finish, the landscape looks like an asteroid hit it,” Markowsky said.

This is not a solution and “if it is … who’s going to build the plants?” The professor explained that there are similar problems with the potential energy of oil sands. “These things don’t solve the problem, they’re all finite resources.”

Wind energy can make a contribution and has a relatively low energy density. “You need a lot of wind to replace a gallon of fuel. The output is erratic and we need to develop storage options. Wind mills are not suitable for every location and they must be very large to be efficient. Again, who’s going to build the 45 million wind mills that it takes and where are we going to put them?” he asked.


SOLAR & WOOD

Solar voltaics are expensive and not suitable for everyplace. Like wind, the output is erratic and you need storage options. “We need energy now –-when will all these solar plants come on line?” Markowsky asked.

Wood is nice as far as it goes and in Maine it’s something that we may need to do a lot more with. Wood does, however, add CO2 to the atmosphere.

Currently there’s a big political and economic boom in wood heating with chips. Chip production, either from the forest or from scrap and dust manufacturing, does create economic opportunities for us here in Maine. And certainly chips have a higher EROI then cord wood due to its lower moisture content. Even if it sounds like chips are a solution to home space heat you have to ask if the manufacturing process, transportation, pollution and the energy involved in making wood chip energy is the answer for a long-term energy crisis solution. Previous to a recent boom in local chip production, most of the product was imported to us in the past from British Columbia.


THEN THERE'S MT. ABRAM

Mt. Abram High School is currently replacing its oil boiler with a boiler that burns wood chips. Over the last two winters, the district’s bus garage has been heated with a chip furnace and a wind turbine is expected to arrive this summer. The MSAD #58 Board of Directors and maintenance staff will soon be spotlighted on the state level for taking the lead in the energy crisis.

Superintendent Quenten Clark said there were so many reasons for getting away from heating oil such as local economic opportunities, keeping money in Maine, using renewable recourses, the potential of job creation and so on.

Another example, he stated, had to do with what’s called the “supply chain” based on a previous bad experience relying on oil. Not relating to that experience, he said if one angry Middle Eastern country launches a missile attack on another it may disrupt his district’s supply of oil. If such a crisis does occur it will most likely not affect his supply of locally produced chips.


OTHER SOURCES

Geothermal, tidal and other energy extraction from the oceans are viable alternative sources and need to be looked at in the future.

There are many proposals out there and we need to make informed decisions ahead with the emphasis on EROI in mind. For example, there was talk two years ago about helium production as a source of energy through a reaction process. The proposal called for the extraction of helium from the moon which contains an abundant amount of the gas. Without crunching the numbers, rocket fuel to get a NASA space station to the moon to extract the product and the cost of the astronauts and space ships would have to be considered. As well as the fact that there is no reactor creating energy from helium in the world.

There may be no one solution on the table today, or as some say we need to consider all the solutions including one of the most important –-conservation.

Markowsky characterized some solutions for the people of Maine. “We still think in terms of centralized solutions; we must think in terms of de-centralized solutions. We need to be innovative, do more with less; conservation must play a large role in this. This is absolutely critical. We are not going to get through this without saving a lot of energy. We are the U.S., leaders of doing more with less.”

Mainers have a lot of mechanical skills, the professor explained, but we must couple it with computer technology to create some really exciting products. “One of the greatest is ideas such as bringing back the external combustion engine,” Markowsky explained. We can burn our junk mail or just about anything using his type of engine, he said. The external combustion engine was made famous in Maine with Kingfield’s own Stanley Steamer. The Stanley Brothers held the land speed record (1906) for many years.


MAINE LEADERS

Markowsky explained that this could be Maine’s century to shine like we did in the 19th century. He said we skipped shining in the 20th century after becoming the “vacation state,” but we can lead like our motto (Dirigo) states in the 21st.

Markowsky spoke of many other great Maine achievements such as the invention of the snowmobile (Creamer); earmuffs (Greenwood); Doughnut Hole Machine (Blondel); Snowplow (Sargent); Power drill (Burleigh); Rumble Seat (Trusty); Thermostat (Spencer); and Auto-Wheel Balancer (Johnson).

And … Markowsky stated, then there’s Jim LaBrecque. “Jim has been a pioneer in efficient energy usage for heating and cooling for many years. He is the Mozart of heating and cooling and it is talent like this that we need to get us through the tough times ahead,” Markowsky explained.

“There are additional ideas that we can look at. The situation is not helpless, but we need to get started now,” Markowsky said. He said there is hope, but the longer we wait the harder it’s going to be.

“I think the State of Maine should take the challenge and become a leader of doing more with less because that’s where it is going to go. It doesn’t matter what anyone’s proposing, we are going to have to redesign everything and rebuild society, because we can not sustain what we are doing. The sooner we get started, the better.”